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Real Estate Marketing Tips: Telling A Story. Part II

The three best salesmen I have ever seen.

Without a doubt, there are salespeople who are extremely skilled at this kind of story-telling. I was just showing a colleague a resort in Puerto Vallarta called Punta Mita. They have three of the best salesmen I’ve seen in my entire life, with one of them earning between one and three million dollars a year in commission alone. And if you watch how these guys work, it’s all story selling. They’re not talking to clients about floor plans, square footage or granite counters. Instead, they’re selling dreams and aspirations.

Understand your clients and their feelings.

How do they do this? First, they take the time to build a relationship, skillfully asking questions, understanding the buyer’s deepest wants and desires, and really diving deep into their client’s mindset. Only once they really understand their client can they begin tailoring the story to suit that individual buyer. For people on the older end of the spectrum, they might talk about making a legacy purchase, something they can hand down to their kids and grandkids. For younger couples, they might paint a picture of family life here in these homes, how they themselves have memories of growing up with a yard/beach/forest like this, and how those are memories they cherish. Trust me when I tell you that stories like this work far better than telling people about the backsplash in the kitchen.

Example: A business owner trying to buy office space.

And this kind of storytelling can work with any type of project – from condos to office space to beachfront homes because every potential buyer has some emotional involvement in their purchase. Take a business owner trying to buy office space, as an example. If they’re anything like me, they hate paying rent. They’re probably sickened by how much money they’ve paid in rent over the life of their business – and they want to buy. They desperately want to feel like they’ve made an investment in a space of their own, and they’re no longer signing checks over to other people. In a case like this, a salesperson needs to tap into the emotional side of this type of buyer, and focus the story on the pride of ownership, the security of having a space that he owns, and the freedom to modify that space any way he wants. It’s a story he wants to hear – and it’s the surest way to get him to buy.